Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise to take note of Senator Brandis's answers to questions asked by Senator Ketter in question time today on the important subject of the rising inequality we are seeing across the country, as outlined in reports by both PwC and ACOSS. I will just pick up on a couple of things that Senator Canavan said. He said that the questions from Labor senators this afternoon were embarrassing for the Labor Party. The Labor Party will always fight inequality when we see it, and the report released today shows that there is rising inequality across the country—and it is not just in the PwC report; it is also in the ACOSS report which was released this morning.

Rather than sheeting home the blame, which is what Senator Canavan just accused Senator Ketter of, Senator Ketter asked two very factual questions of Senator Brandis this afternoon. They were (1) whether the claim that more than one-third of Australia is in recession was correct, which I do not think was answered by Senator Brandis; and (2) whether it is true that every one in five dollars of national income is produced in just 10 of 214 locations in Australia. Again, I do not think that question was answered by Senator Brandis either. In terms of the answer that was provided, there were some areas with which I agreed—the fact that it is good that we are seeing economic growth across the country. Even if that growth is slow, it is a positive.

But I think any responsible government opening the paper today and seeing the news story about the PwC report, which as I understand it is going to be released tomorrow, would look at this very closely and as a government say, 'Okay, what do we need to do about this? If some parts of the country are doing well but others are clearly not doing well—indeed, a third of the country, in PwC's terms, is experiencing recession—as the government of Australia what we do about this?'

That is the point made by the ACOSS report, which claims that some elements of the social compact—that is, policies around full employment, universal access to public education, wage regulation, progressive income taxes and a well-targeted social security safety net—are key areas which address inequality in a country. It is these areas which seem to be 'unravelling', to quote the ACOSS report. It is also these areas which are under attack from this government, which does not lead us on this side of the chamber to believe that there is a serious plan to address the rising inequality in the country. As my colleague Andrew Leigh often says, central to tackling inequality is maintaining a sense of pride in our egalitarian ethos—that is, that we all work together to ensure that all citizens of Australia are treated equally.

In his answer, Senator Brandis said it is the policies of this government that will address these issues. But, when we look at the policies of this government, we see the cuts to schools and health funding, the attacks on pensioners—pitting pensioners against pensioners; that is what is contained in this budget, where we have pensioners having to justify their pension against other those of other pensioners—and cuts to services like homelessness services and community legal services. These are all services that ensure that we do have that egalitarian ethos, that we have fair wages for work performed. These are all central to the social compact that is being consistently undermined by this government.

Senator Brandis can pretend this is not his problem. Senator Canavan can say that it is everyone else's problem, 'It's the previous government's problem.' But the reality is that we are seeing rising inequality in this country, and it is not clear that there is a plan from the government to address it. Those on this side of the chamber will always stand up and draw matters like this to the attention of the chamber when they occur.

Question agreed to.